How Ninja Brush Their Teeth

  The cat bawled again, scratching on his door.

  He sneaked down his hall and stooped low next to his front door. “Go away. “Shoo!” he whispered loudly through the door. The cat hesitated, making a questioning mewl before scratching even more frantically.

  “No.”

  It yowled even more desperately in return.

  The neighbor banged against his floor again.

  Tetsuo was tired and just wanted to get back to bed. He had an early morning shipment coming he needed to supervise.

  He gave in and opened the door.

  The cat flew inside, running straight for the shag carpeting and rubbing itself in the fibers.

  “I’m going to bed. Don’t make any more noise or I will silent you—permanently.”

  The cat looked at him, eyes half-opened and content, paws kneading the carpet. “Mrr,” it replied, unimpressed.

  He turned into his bedroom and threw himself back in his bed, firmly covering his head with his pillow.

  Now, something was in his room, but before he could throw himself out of bed, he heard the cat purring and relaxed. The cat was on his bed, kneading his blankets into a nice nest for itself.

  Angry at the intrusion and for having lost sleep he knocked the cat off the bed with a long swipe of his arm, causing it to crash halfway down the opposite wall. The cat panicked and scrambled out of his room, claws digging deeply in the carpet as it streaked down the hall back into the living room.

  “I should have just broken its neck and been done with it,” he muttered. But instead of laying back down to go to sleep, he lay awake and worried.

  Worried he hadn’t meant it.

  Five

  Vasha heard the heavy footfalls and door slamming as Tetsuo rushed out of his apartment and thundered down the stairwell to run for his bus. He hadn’t slept much last night and she had heard him hit his snooze alarm several times before committing to actual waking.

  She wrapped her robe around her, grabbed her watering can, stood outside of her door in the bright early morning sunshine, and smiled. It felt strange to smile again, old muscles being pulled again after being slack so long. She watered the hanging hibiscus plants that adorned her entryway, whistling an old, forgotten melody when she felt something warm and furry rub against her bare legs beneath her robe.

  “Good kitty,” she murmured.

  ***

  Tetsuo had company today in his cramped office in the back of the warehouse. A short, stocky, bald man paced back in forth in front of the grimy, dust covered, plexiglass window.

  “You’re late,” Kenta said flatly, when Tetsuo entered.

  Tetsuo looked at his watch and shook his head, “No, I’m on time. It is 6:00 AM, exactly.”

  “On time is late today.”

  “I wasn’t aware of that.”

  Kenta filled his chest, as if preparing for a long speech. “Do you have any idea how important your job here is today?”

  “Actually, I don’t. All I know is that I was to be here two hours early to supervise a sensitive shipment.”

  “And what do you believe your job here is?”

  “I’m a warehouse manager—”

  Kenta pointed a short stubby finger at him, his lips thinned in anger. “Wrong. You are an operative. Don’t you ever forget that.”

  Kenta had meant the harsh words and pointy finger to be corrective, but Tetsuo felt relief. He even smiled a little.

  “You think this is a joke?” Kenta snapped.

  “No sir, I’m relieved.”

  “Relieved?”

  “Yes, relieved I’m still an operative. I thought I’d been demoted to this job permanently, for my past mishap with the rouge Rogov Clan member, sir.”

  Kenta’s hard, coal black eyes softened for a brief moment, before they set back into stone.

  “You were demoted, but I stuck my neck out for you, reminded them of how valuable an asset you were and suggested you would be useful to us here.” Kenta lowered his voice to a whisper, “Prove my words right today and you will be back in the Circle.”

  Tetsuo, bowed his head, “Thank you, Kenta,” he whispered.

  “Don’t let me down again, Tetsuo,” Kenta whispered back, before clearing his throat and sitting down heavily in Tetsuo’s ancient, shrilly squeaking office chair. With an indifferent swipe of his arm he brushed a month’s worth of careful and tedious shipment files onto the floor and tossed what looked like a flat black computer mouse pad onto Tetsuo’s newly cleared desk.

  “Close the blinds please,” Kenta motioned with his chin. Tetsuo complied, pulling down the shades as he watched Kenta lean towards the mouse pad and say, “Open.” It flashed briefly before a 3D holographic image of the warehouse blueprints sprang up before his eyes.

  Kenta must have noticed the wonder in Tetsuo’s eyes as he stared at the new tech on the table. He did miss the toys.

  Snapping his fingers impatiently, Kenta said, “We have two hours to prepare. Pay attention.”

  ***

  The grocery store wasn’t too busy today, which was just another reason for Tetsuo to lighten his already cheery mood. Today had been a success; he had performed what Kenta had asked of him and even impressed Clan Leader Goemon with his calm professional manner—at least that was Kenta texted him an hour after the meeting. Goemon and a few council members had decided to hold a discreet meeting with some old rivals at the warehouse with hopes of becoming new business allies. They needed Tetsuo there, ready to handle things if they went sour.

  Luckily for him, they didn’t. Not to say he wasn’t prepared, but if a victory could be won without a battle, it was always the preference.

  Tetsuo browsed the aisle at the store, stocking up on easily prepared meals and Ramen noodles. Hopefully, with the good impression he had left on the new clan leader, it would mean a pay raise and he could go back to eating better.

  He was about to turn down another aisle when he noticed it wasn’t the one he had wanted. He was in the pet food aisle. His eyes fell on a big bag of Purina cat food and he glanced at the price. It was half-off.

  Tetsuo shook himself off and moved past the aisle. He would not feed the cat. That would be stupid.

  He turned down the toiletry aisle and stocked up on toilet paper, desperately missing the washlet bidet toilets from home. It baffled him how America was so advanced in every other area of technology, yet they continued to wipe their ass with paper leaves like barbarians.

  Something in the air shifted. She was here. He could feel the false silence of someone trying to hide from him in the store. He continued filling his basket, trying not to let her know he had noticed her.

  He used his highly attuned peripheral vision to his advantage, scanning the aisles as he made his way towards the checkout stand.

  He felt it one row up from him, and turned into the aisle next to it and waited. Luckily, it was the magazine aisle and he half-pretended to read.

  He felt her now, crouching and creeping up behind him.

  “Stalking someone in a public store? A little tacky don’t you think?” he said over his shoulder, smirking.

  “HI-YAH!” a small voice yelled loudly. He turned just in time to see a five-year-old child dressed in a shoddy ninja costume and attempting to run him through with two plastic ninjato swords.

  Just a child, Tetsuo thought. But he had felt her. He was sure of it.

  “Yah-hi-YAH!” the boy yelled again, swinging his swords wildly.

  “Gary! You stop that right now!” a beleaguered looking woman shouted, as she came running down the aisle. “I’m so sorry,” she said to Tetsuo grabbing the boy’s arm and pulling him away. “Ever since he got his little ninja outfit he just thinks he can attack anyone he sees. Which he can’t,” she said, kneeling down to look at her son at eye level, “and that’s why someone can say goodbye to video games when we get home!”

  “But, Mom! He knewed I was just playing!”

  “Doesn’t matter. We’re going home,” She glanced
one more time at Tetsuo, giving him an apologetic smile.

  Tetsuo stood in the aisle for a moment, and concentrated. He tried to reach out with his awareness and feel her again, but it was gone.

  He was definitely losing his touch to mistake a little child for his enemy. He decided to grab some incense, too. Maybe a little meditation would do him some good tonight. Coincidentally, the air freshener aisle also happened to share the same aisle as the pet food.

  He made the impulse buy he was sure he was going to regret later.

  Six

  Tetsuo lounged on his worn leather couch, reading an old book of poetry and trying to soak up the last rays of the sun as it dipped behind a large maple outside of his apartment window.

  The cat also lay in the diminishing rectangle of warmth that crawled a slow path across Tetsuo’s living room floor. The food Tetsuo had given it earlier had been devoured within minutes of him placing the bowl on the floor.

  He had watched the cat with its swollen belly meander out into the living room afterwards, and sit in the sun patch, licking its paws and washing its face.

  Watching the cat relaxed him. He decided he would feed it and let it stay in the house when he was home, but it would be outside and on its own the rest of the time.

  The book of poetry wasn’t holding his interest and he tossed it on a nearby coffee table.

  He should probably name the cat. Looking at it, he tried to think of a name that fit other than the obvious, Orange Cat, which was the first thing that came to his mind.

  Maybe, O.C.? He smiled and tested out the name on the cat.

  “O.C.?” Tetsuo called in a higher octave than usual. The cat stopped licking and looked at him with questioning eyes.

  “O.C., come here,” he patted the couch. The cat stood up, arched its back in a luxurious stretch, slowly made its way to the couch, and sat down. Tetsuo reached out his hand and scratched the cat’s ears, the cat erupting into a deep, satisfied purr.

  “O.C., it is.”

  ***

  “Who got himself a cat?” Vince, the hairy, dwarf biker, interrupted, while grabbing a large handful of peanuts out of the complimentary bowl. Tetsuo was sitting, talking with Chuck, the leader of this strange group which met every Wednesday at the bar, until they were interrupted.

  “Do you mind?” Chuck said, shoving Vince away and trying to continue where he had left off.”

  “Hey, I’s just askin’ cause me and the wife take in strays all the time. We got lots of cats,” Vince, popped a peanut shell in his mouth, sucking off the salt off before cracking it in his teeth. Before he was done, his long goatee was covered in bits of shell and peanut. “You know, just asking. In case you needed any tips or anything,” he shrugged before he wandered off, leaving a trail of spent peanut shells along the way.

  “Don’t mind him. He means well.”

  Tetsuo, smiled, an expression he was still getting used to. “I don’t mind. I find everyone here … refreshing.”

  “Refreshing, huh? Well, I must say, that is one of the rarer comments made about our group.”

  T.B., who was also sitting at the table, sniffed an armpit before making a sour face. “Gotta agree with ya there,” he grumbled, before breaking out into a childish grin.

  “So, other than taking in a stray cat, how you been doing?” Chuck asked as he prepared to take a few gulps of beer from his glass.

  Tetsuo shrugged. He didn’t know how to answer. The whole thing was awkward for him. His only friends had been members of the White Viper clan. There simply were no outside associations.

  And yet, he felt like he could trust Chuck in spite of it. Besides Kenta, he didn’t feel there were many people left to trust. However, even with him, he knew if it came down to it, Kenta would always choose the clan over him. To expect any more would be disrespectful to both Kenta and the clan.

  But under all the leather, tattoos, and hair, he believed Chuck was a genuinely good man.

  As much as Tetsuo wanted to honestly answer Chuck’s simple question, he couldn’t. It would be irresponsible and foolish to admit to anything barely resembling the truth, yet the temptation to do so was overwhelming because he felt, for the first time, the person listening genuinely cared about him; and that temptation, even for a hardened ninja assassin, was a powerful thing to resist.

  In spite of his conflicting feelings, he told his usual, well practiced cover story and hoped it would be enough before casually trying to change the subject.

   

  Chuck sat back after Tetsuo was done talking, stroked his beard thoughtfully and shook his head. “So, that’s your story, huh?”

  Tetsuo nodded.

  Chuck sighed, a wry smile spread across his deeply lined face, “Well, I may be older now, and out of touch about certain things, but I know a bullshit cover story when I hear one.”

  Tetsuo blinked, “I’m sorry? What do you mean?”

  Chuck reached for his beer. “Nothing. And listen, Ted, if you don’t want to tell me something, or if I’m gettin’ too nosey, just tell me to back off next time. Ask anybody here—I’m as loyal as they come. If you got a friend in me, you got a friend for your whole life, but one thing I can’t stand is when people disrespect my intelligence by lying to me. If I’m too much in your business, just let me know. But don’t lie to me.”

  Tetsuo nodded. He could respect that. And he was also beginning to respect the fact there was more to Chuck than he had realized.

  Maybe it was time to give up this little charade anyway. As much as he liked Chuck personally, he didn’t have anything in common with this group, and in the long run it would only endanger them.

  “Okay,” he said, “I’m sorry to have offended you. I probably shouldn’t be here anyway.”

  “Now, I didn’t say you had to go, Ted. I’m sure you got your reasons for things. I may have only met you once before, but there’s something about you I trust—even when my common sense is telling me otherwise.”

  Tetsuo could appreciate the sentiment, because it was the way he also felt about Chuck. “Likewise,” he nodded.

  “Good. That said, I’d hate to see you leave after only one of those,” Chuck nodded at Tetsuo’s empty glass. “And besides, I like your company. I guess I find you just as refreshing.”

  Chuck looked at T.B., “No offence to you, but you smell like a mastodon.”

  T.B. shrugged, as if in agreement and drained his beer glass before finishing it all off with a loud belch.

  Seven

  He was home late again after yet another night at the bar. She could hear the light creak of his footsteps as he walked around his apartment, the pebbly sound of cat food being poured into a ceramic bowl and the soft cooing way he talked to his cat.

  He seemed to be settling into his new life, apparently approving of the new Clan Leader, Goemon—or perhaps blinded by his loyalty. Although her clan was an ancient enemy of the White Vipers, there was still a mutual respect about the business they were in, but even more so of the business they chose not to be in.

  As much as she hated Tetsuo, she had come to know him as she observed him so closely. He didn’t seem like the kind to approve of drug trafficking.

  But then again, he was getting soft. She had tested him at the supermarket, but he’d failed to notice her, thrown off completely by a child and a young mother and never suspecting it was the elderly woman in the walker in line behind him at the checkout counter.

  Such an amateur mistake.

  That’s also when she noticed him buying cat food.

  Not to mention, she had been renting the apartment below him for almost the same amount of time as him since he had been transferred after his last job—the one that killed Michael.

  Why did she care so much about how soft he was getting? What did she care if he settled into some new life in the clan?

  It would work in her favor, wouldn’t it? A softer target to take her revenge?

  But this revenge of hers—this thing she clung to as if
somehow it would make the fading memories of her brief life with Michael stay longer—it was doing the opposite. It ate away at her memories of him. More and more it was no longer the face of Michael she imagined as she faded off into sleep at night, but Tetsuo’s.

  She desperately needed him out of her head. She would have to take action, and soon.

  And then she could get on with her life.

   

  Several hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. She sensed something was wrong.

  She was wondering when her old Clan would send someone for her. They didn’t like the loose threads ex-clan members made. Not to mention, she was playing spider and had left an easy trail for them to follow.

  She wondered if they had noticed who her upstairs neighbor was. She doubted it.

  If they had taken her teaching seriously, they would have.

  Who had they sent to her first? Nicolai? Alexi? It didn’t matter. She had taught them all the art of tracking prey.

  She walked down the hall and headed to her bedroom window. Sliding the window open, she crawled out and landed silently on the ground outside.

  She immediately spotted a dark hooded figure creeping down the walkway, one hand lightly touching the wall of the apartments, the other holding a gun behind his back.

  How stupid. Although she was silent, the intruder should have felt her by now and turned around. Annoyed, she slunk up to the individual and casually slipped a cord around his neck and twisted. She caught the gun he dropped as his hands went towards his neck. She pulled back on the cord until her would-be attacker was leaning back against her chest, and she looked to see who it was. She snorted in disgust, it was Peotr—a neophyte of the clan—not even a proper operative and probably never would be. Poor thing, probably thought this was his big moment. “You realize they sent you to die, don’t you?” she asked.

  The young man kicked his feet against the cement walkway. His face was turning purple, eyes going glassy. She let up on the lariat just enough for him to stay conscious, but barely. He took a raking breath before she pulled the cord against his throat again.

  “Traitor,” the man gasped, wasting the breath she gave him.